Trying to use Bazille for percussion... little help needed

[jumpercable]

Bazille has a great sound for percussion, but Im missing some flexibility which somebody may have solved with clever routing. Im trying to emulate the function of alot of percussion synths, like microtonic.

The thing I keep bumping into is I cant get a big range with a downward pitch modulation. Needed for kicks and alot of other percussion.

i.e. I want to modulate one oscillators pitch with anothers - quickly bringing the pitch down to the lowest value. But Im finding whatever way I route it, the range is quite low.

For example, microtonics range is "-48 semi-tones to +48 semi- tones
(-4 octaves to +4 octaves)"

Would this be possible in Bazille? Ive been changing the osc types, messing with levels, and I just cant get a satisfactory pitch range.

Id love to get a working patch that I can just modulate a few parameters to create different sounds like a drum synth.

Any help is really appreciated.

[Ch00rD]

The pitch modulation in Bazille is ±50 semi-tones, so it is certainly feasible. You can also use the multipliers to increase the range of a modulation source; here's an example patch doing that with oscillator 2 modulating the pitch of oscillator 1.

For drum computer-like percussion, you can also use resonant filters with resonance values at or near self-oscillation, and use the resonance oscillation instead of an oscillator. When modulating the cut-off, you have a range of 150 semi-tones. Here's a patch that uses this technique, with a bunch of envelopes (note that you can have an envelope recursively modulate itself, which may be useful for getting some different curve shapes for the 'pitch' modulation).

(Fwiw, these are just some very simple experimental patches for illustration technique, not patches with sounds I would actually like to use - I still haven't played enough with Bazille to have a decent collection of 'good' patches; but I bet someone else must have a few much better ones to share.)

[Bronto Scorpio]

Bazille has a great sound for percussion...

Yep! Bazille it the ultimate synth for electronic drums imo

The easiest way to solve your problem is to add the envelope you want to use to itself. Like this:



This way you get a modulation range of 100 semitones (50 + 50), which should be enough in most cases. If you still need more you can also route the same env to input 3 and 4 of the multiplier thingy.

If you need some inspiration for drum sounds I suggest you to download my "Infection" bank for Bazille from here

I hope this helps!

Cheers
Dennis

[xh3rv]

If you need some inspiration for drum sounds I suggest you to download my "Infection" bank for Bazille from here

Definitely, and some of the multi-hit / sequenced stuff in there is pretty revelatory.

[pdxindy]

Bazille has a great sound for percussion...

Yep! Bazille it the ultimate synth for electronic drums imo
Cheers
Dennis

+1

[jumpercable]

Wow, ok, where to start!

Thanks so much for the help. I thought I was comfortable with modular synth like bazille, but wow. I did not know alot of the techniques used here. Mind blown.

I understood routings, modulations. But the "routing the adsr back into itself" trick... Never would have guessed that. Id have previously been of the knowledge "adsr doesnt route sound out, so that wont work." Ha. And obviously theres alot more that stems from that understanding.

Thanks ChOOrD, yeah, that helped alot understand how to increase the range. So thank you for the patches. I can definitely experiment more now with percussion. Theres alot of info in this thread Im just getting my head arounf.



Bronto Scorpio - my head hurts following your patches! Theyre great - Im constantly looking at them going - "HOW?!!"

One thing Im finding with Bazille is - its not as easy to reverse engineer patches as other synths. In the case of Brontos - I can find the routings that are making the patch special but Ive no idea WHY theyre doing what theyre doing.

Without a manual for Bazille, Im still completely in the dark about some things.

What I realize now is that Bazille almost has to be viewed electrically - rather than just sonically to understand certain concepts.




Would somebody be able to break down a couple of the advanced concerpts/modules for me?

The mixer panel isnt just a mixer im guessing now.

For example, in Brontos Infection bank - "Layer 02 (vel)"

ADSR2 is routed to the ring mod. And OSC 2 output is routed to input 1, mixer 2. This literally makes no sense to me. I thought RM was an output - and would ringmod 1,2 with 3,4. But theres only one input...

What do CV1, CV2 and +5V do exactly? I know cv is control voltage... thats about it.


A general theme with the patches are - using white noise to control other synth aspects instead of routing it directly out, causing tiny amounts of noise to build up in the modulations. It gives a much less severe sound to the white noise than either routing it directly out or even routing it to a filter 1st.



Before I ask about what the heck the modifier section does - is there anything I could read/look up to understand it better? Or figure out the musical value of some of the mods?


So many questions, my post is a little more wordy now than I originally intended.

[Howard]

The mixer panel isnt just a mixer im guessing now.
For example, in Brontos Infection bank - "Layer 02 (vel)"
ADSR2 is routed to the ring mod. And OSC 2 output is routed to input 1, mixer 2. This literally makes no sense to me. I thought RM was an output - and would ringmod 1,2 with 3,4. But theres only one input...

Described in the ACE user guide - http://www.u-he.com/downloads/ACE/ACE_user_guide.pdf on page 24 "Multiples"

[Ch00rD]

[...] What do CV1, CV2 and +5V do exactly? I know cv is control voltage... thats about it. [...]

CV is used much the same (but of course of the virtual variety) here: as a general type of continuous signal, usable for modulation at audio rates.

The CV1 and CV2 inputs in the 'OUTPUTS' section can be used to modulate panning: select CV1 or CV2 as a modulation source in the dropdown menu for the controls to the right of the panning controls. Then try connecting a LFO or envelope - or go crazy and use an oscillator (try e.g. a sine wave at the same frequency, or a square wave one octave below the fundamental). Anything goes. Have fun.

+5V is simply a constant positive value. It is useful for adding a fixed offset to some arbitrary CV signal.

[pdxindy]

I understood routings, modulations. But the "routing the adsr back into itself" trick... Never would have guessed that. Id have previously been of the knowledge "adsr doesnt route sound out, so that wont work." Ha. And obviously theres alot more that stems from that understanding.

Everything is just a signal... and you can manipulate them in all sorts of musically interesting ways! It is just a different way of thinking than the usual way. Having worked quite a lot with Bazille, now I miss all manner of techniques when I use other synths.